Neptune conjunction Jupiter
This conjunction occurs approximately every thirteen years, and tends to create characteristics that are often similar to the Pisces temperament, where both the positive and the negative qualities of both planets are present and highly active. Tendencies towards excess, idealism, creativity and naivety will be evident. The Jupiter impulse of expansion may encourage you to reach beyond your actual capabilities. Whilst this can aid in stretching you - and in some cases you will succeed to a greater degree - the likeiihood is that when it is combined with a Neptunian distorted perception of your abilities you will fail more regularly than triumph. Over time this can become a repetitive and inhibitory pattern which powers your self-confidence. The sphere of relationships is likely to be a source of many lessons for you, and to reflect back several of your own tendencies towards those less realistic qualities of Jupiter and Neptune that are present in an unintegrated personality. Whilst faith and trust are potentially positive qualities to possess, life experience often demonstrates that placing our confidence in everyone will unfortunately and inevitably lead to disillusionment. In the ideal world this would be possible, but in our current reality there are many who will self-centredly take advantage of others' naivety and innocence (and ignorance too). A more realistic appraisal of the motivations and nature of others is necessary; an unconscious automatic offering of your trust and faith in the goodwill and fine nature of others will lead to your abuse. Discrimination is always required, so that you can recognise those in whom such fragile qualities will be rightly respected. Blind faith is an innocence waiting to be ruined; and many will be queuing up to take their pickings. Yet this ideal of relationships will still persist, oftne despite many disappointing experiences over the years. It is probably wiser to be more careful in your more personal and intimate relationships, because unless you are aware of what is occurring, your love life could be painful. As you have a natural impulse to care and serve others, you could be exploited by less scrupulous individuals, taking advantage ot those tendencies of sacrifice and martyrdom that hide within the Neptune influence. This also leads you towards illusions related to the feelings of others for you, where you convince yourself that hey are a strong and true love, and then allow yourself to become deeply committed to the relationship; you may be correct in your assessment, but it is an area in which you are very vulnerable to self-deception, and perhaps more caution and less haste should be advised. Time take in establishing others' motivations and deeper nature is often time well spent; resorting back to a blind faith, trust and assumptions founded on satisfying your own needs can be a recipe for future problems. A careful evaluation of the other is necessary; otherwise, under the pressure of actual marriage or living together, other aspects of the other's nature will emerge which may not suit you (or vice versa). Many relationships flounder today due to mutual self-ignorance, where inner projections of illusions and the anima-animus patterns overlay the real nature of the participants, until time dissolves them and each partner wakes up to realise that they are living with a stranger. It is not suggested that you become overly sceptical or cynical, but that a deeper and discriminatory look is made, into both your own nature and that of any proposed partner. It may be that those tendencies of faith and trust should be applied in a more impersonal sphere, where instead of having to believe in individuals (who are always capable of letting you down) it becomes more abstracted into a belief in the essntial goodness of humanity that is slowly evolving and being anchored in the world. Certainly your experience of relationships will be a testing ground, and one where many lessons can be realised; and, it is to be hoped, where your evaluations will become more acute and realistic. When disappointment strikes you, there is a tendency to retreat into a private fantasy world. This can be positively used as a self-healing technique, but you must avoid any temptation to use this purely as an escape, for if you do so you risk losing contact with reality. A place to consider the implicit lessons and meanings for you, yes, but not one where you elevate withdrawal as a means to remain ignorant and persist in any illusions. You may have desires to experience 'sublime feelings and emotions', an intensity that is not commonly found in everyday life, and an expansion beyond your normal boundaries of existence. This can be a latent mystical proclivity, which you search for in love affairs. You may be similarly attracted towards involvement with drugs, alcohol or spiritual cults. Certainly the addictive attractions should be avoided, and if you do look towards the spiritual scene, be careful of illusions related to gurus, cults and the like. Discrimination is vitally necessary in these realms too. Throughout your life, there should be a fertile imagination at work, which may find means of expression in art, music or literature, or by absorption in religion and philosophy. Suitable channels for this imagination need to be established, or else it will just amplify your inner dreams and distorting illusions. Idealism will remain strong, although there can be a lack of real practicality and common sense, where through a lack of persistent self-discipline you often fail to deliver what you are capable of doing. As a result of your high emotional sensitivity, you may be attracted towards work related to a feeling of social obligation, where social welfare and aid for others becomes dominant. Such spheres as medicine, nursing, mental health, teaching, community welfare or voluntary service could satisfy this need. You may have to guard against becoming too personally involved when you offer sympathy and support, or else your own ability to serve will be weighed down by the weight of the world on your shoulders. That type of martyrdom which turns you into a victim is often an unnecessary sacrifice, and can be avoided by a different inner perspective.